Frequently Asked Questions FAQs

Majority of Customers will be able to have their problem solved after reading and following the steps on the FAQ page.

Q) My printer is not recognising the cartridge what should I do?

Q)I have installed the new cartridges and the print quality is bad or there is no ink at all appearing on the paper or the colour did not print out correctly on the paper.

Q) The electronic chips fitted to the compatible Ink Cartridges look different to the Chips found on the original cartridges.

Q) The electronic chips fitted to the compatible Ink Cartridges look different to the previous ink cartridges I have.

Q) The Compatible Ink Cartridges are physically a different size or shape.

Q) I’ve have been using the compatible ink in my printer for a while, and it won’t recognise one or a few of the cartridges now, what can I do?

Please scroll down for the answers.

Q) My printer is not recognising the cartridge what should I do?

Check the printer manual to see whether you installed the correct cartridge or not.

If you have installed the correct cartridge in the right place, please follow the steps as below.

Did you mix the compatible ink with some original ink cartridge in the printer? If yes, please remove all cartridges in the printer at the moment, and put in a whole new set of compatible cartridges and this should solve the problem. As mentioned on the invoice, if you mix the compatible cartridge with original one, this can cause compatibility problems & can cause the compatible cartridge unusable & need replace with a new one. This is common error, so we put a note on the invoice.

If there are no original ink cartridges in the printer, you can try the steps below: The printer reset step (Step 4) is the important step, most customers have told us that after this step the printer will be able to recognise the cartridges.

1. Double checkthe wedge on ALL of the cartridges have removed, otherwise the wedge will prevent the cartridge to go down enough for the chip to make contact with the printer, make sure the cartridges are firmly seated, by giving them another little push on the top of each one also ensuring you have removed the yellow tag to allow the ink to flow.

2. If step 1 fails, take the cartridges out and with a soft cloth or tissue, wipe the contacts of the chip in case there is a bad contact and repeat step 1. After that if still fail try step 3.

3. Switch the printer off at the mains or un-plug it for 1 min. (Not using the On/Off switch on the printer). This clears the printer memory and allows it to reset for your new cartridges (Sometimes it may need to be done a couple of times).

4. If just 1 cartridge is not being recognised, try replacing this one with a new cartridge. If all 4 do not recognised, try replacing cartridges one at a time, sometime if one of the cartridges has a faulty chip then the printer will likely reject all of them, so you can work out which cartridge cause the error.

If all 4 show not being recognise, we recommend replacing cartridges one at a time, as if one of the cartridges has a faulty chip then the printer will likely reject all of them. If your printer is unable to automatically work out which colour is causing the problem, please try the steps below:

a). Remove all the cartridges from the printer, close the cartridge cover.

b). Switch the printer off at the mains or un-plug it for 1 min. (Not using the On/Off switch on the printer). This clears the printer memory and allows it to reset for your new cartridges (Sometimes it may need to be done a couple of times).

c). Turn the printer on and the printer should say insert cartridge or no cartridges installed etc.

d). Put in the cartridge one at a time, if the printer accepts and registered the cartridge, moves to the next one. When you have insert a cartridge and the printer show cartridge not recognise, this cartridge is likely to have a faulty chip to cause the error, remove it and move to the next one.

e). So you should be able to work out which cartridge caused the problem.

If you still having problem after these steps, please let us know the cartridge number on the cartridges you have received, also your printer model, which cartridge(s) is not recognising by the printer, the exact error message as show on your printer (email us a photo if you can). We will then get this issue solve for you ASAP.

Q)I have installed the new cartridges and the print quality is bad or there is no ink at all appearing on the paper or the colour did not print out correctly on the paper.

The problem you have described is usually caused by some dirty or blocked print head nozzle(s) on the printer side rather than the cartridges side. 1 or more colour can not get to the paper properly so the colour did not mix correctly to cause the colour mismatch or bad quality print.

Please try the followings steps, these steps will be able clean the dirty print head.

1. Please double check that the yellow or orange sticker has removed completely to allow the ink to flow inside the cartridges.

2. Please refer to the printer manual to perform a nozzle check to see which colour did not print correctly and need cleaning.

3. If you have missing line on the printed pattern, you then need to perform a head cleaning process, after that wait 5 minutes and repeat step 2. If after 3 head cleaning and you still have no improvement at all on the nozzle check pattern. You may have a blocked print head which need to be unblocked.

Blocked print head is common problems with printers not have been used often & the ink drying in or under the printer head. Also from time to time there is a dried ink in the printer head and by doing lots of cleaning cycles will not help, you will just waste a lot of ink, causing more ink to accumulate under the print head, which will make matters worse since it will dry very quickly.

You can search the internet for "How to unblock Print head", due to this is fairly common issue with printers and you will find a lot of articles. Or you can search on the internet for “print head cleaner”.

After you have unblocked the print head, print a colour page every 2-3 weeks to maintain the print head so that you will not have this problem again in the future.

Q) The electronic chips fitted to the compatible Ink Cartridges look different to the Chips found on the original cartridges.

This is because the compatible manufacturers ARE NOT allowed copying them due to copyright laws, and so needing to make them slightly differently. They are designed to perform and work in the same manor.

Q) The electronic chips fitted to the compatible Ink Cartridges look different to the previous ink cartridges I have.

There are a few different electronics chip manufacturers around for the ink cartridges, the ink cartridge manufacturers do not make the chip themselves, and they just buy the chip from the electronics chip manufacturers. Therefore the look of the electronics chip on the cartridges can be different from batch to batch, colour to colour. They are designed to perform and work in the same manor.

Q) The Compatible Ink Cartridges are physically a different size or shape.

This is because the compatible manufacturers ARE NOT allowed copying them due to copyright laws, and so needing to make them differently. They are designed to perform and work in the same manor. This does not affect the fitting or functionally of the cartridges in any way at all.

Q) I’ve have been using the compatible ink in my printer for a while, and it won’t recognise one or a few of the cartridges now, what can I do?

Important: If you have been using a compatible Epson cartridge which after quite a few pages of printing and is now registering as not recognised, it is actually empty & need replaced!

Compatible cartridge will not display that "ink run out, please replace the cartridge" like the original one. When the printer prompts "ink cartridges cannot be recognized", it means the ink has been run out and a new cartridge needs to be replaced with. Our compatible cartridges have more ink than the original one, so if there is little ink left inside the cartridges even if when the chip is out of lifespan when used in some printers, this is normal & this is not a fault. Cartridges are configured to print only the amount of ink held within the product. Within the compatible industry, it is quite common that the compatible cartridge holds more ink than the Original cartridges. Therefore, once the printer has printed its recognised quota of pages, the printer will automatically prompt you to change the cartridge.

Could the cartridge actually be empty so quickly?

If you’ve recently been printing large amounts then it’s possible you’ve used more ink than you thought, and even if you’ve printed nowhere near the quoted page yield of your cartridge it may still be empty.

This is all due to the way this figure is quoted, which is using an industry standard 5% page coverage (the ISO standard for estimating page yields).

Also, lot of times the printer use ink without you notice it, even you have not print out anything. Here is the example:

Installing a new cartridge takes ink out of all the cartridges during the ink charging process, if some of the other cartridges is low on ink which may result in another one becoming empty when you have just replace a cartridge.

Running maintenance cycles (eg. head cleaning using a lot of ink).

Initialisation processes - each time you turn the printer on and off etc. That is why every time you turn the printer on or off it will take a while & you can hear the printer is doing something.

Q)Printer Warning Message (Applies to most Epson compatible)

"The installed ink cartridges differ from the original EPSON ink cartridges for this printer... ...You printouts may be different from those printed using the original EPSON cartridges. Do you want to continue using the currently installed ink cartridges?" or similar message

The printouts will usually not differ so simply reply "YES" to this message. Printing will continue as normal.